ATEN usb-serial adapter and OS X 10.6, Macaxepad

jeremyhall

New Member
Hi,

I have an older serial cable but since I own a macbook, I have no serial ports.
I have an 'ATEN' chipset serial adapter (link to manufacturer's product page), an have installed the macaxe application, but cannot get macaxepad to connect to the serial device.

Looking in /dev/ I can see that the USB adapter is present as /dev/tty.UC-232AC.

Locating the axepad.ini file, I can locate the following :

[Target for Mac]
PortNamePrefix=/dev/tty.SerialPort-1
Port=0000101D


And by changing tty.SerialPort-1 to tty.UC-232AC I can get the device to show up correctly in macaxepad :



However, I don't know what to put in the blank 'port' text field.
It doesn't give any helpful error messages.
I have installed the driver/kext from the manufacturer.

And can this even work? I read that the picaxe requires inverted Tx and Rx or something...

Cheers,
Jeremy
 
Last edited:

hippy

Technical Support
Staff member
You can leave the port field blank as you've specified it's full name in the .Ini file. What error message do you get ? It may be more helpful than you believe !

The PICAXE doesn't require any peculiar configuration, any USB-to-Serial cable giving compatible RS232 signal polarity is compatible with the PICAXE. The USB-to-Serial cable needs to support 'break signalling' and this may not. We recommend the AXE027 USB Serial Cable for PICAXE programming.
 

kengabrielrov

New Member
Hi,
I have recently purchased a Macbook air laptop with OSX Lion as the operating system.
I previously was using a Dell Mini 9 set up with OSX Leopard. The Dell ran Macaxepad without any issues however it died (kaput SSD) so I have had to start from scratch with MacaxePad.
I have downloaded the latest version and it runs but won't recognise my ATEN usb serial converter.
If I boot the machine in 32 bit mode (press 3 & 2 at startup) I can see it in the /dev/ list as tty.usbserial (no hyphen or digits after that) but the kicker for me at the moment is I can't find the axe pad.ini file anywhere on the machine, so I can't edit the entry for the converter. Interestingly when I let the machine boot normally (64bit mode) the Usb converter does not appear in the /dev list at all.
Do I have a 32 / 64 bit issue, is there a different axepad version for Lion as opposed to Leopard or is the issue in the way this machine is set up?
I am aware that the AXE027 is the supported option and there is one winging its way to me but I fear I have another issue because I can't see the .ini file.
Any hints would be appreciated.
Thanks
Ken
 

hippy

Technical Support
Staff member
Where the .ini file is stored can vary but the location can be found using Help -> Configuration Details within MacAXEpad. Scroll down and there will be a Settings Path entry which shows the folder settings are held in.

I don't have a Mac system to hand but that is /home/administrator on the Linux machine I do have. Within that folder is a hidden folder .LinAXEpad ( which will be .MacAXEpad on a Mac ) and within that you will find axepad.ini

With the AXE027 drivers it should be that you do not need to edit the .ini file and configuration should be possible using just MacAXEpad View -> Options -> Ports. We do not have a different MacAXEpad for OS X Lion nor for 64-bit systems.
 

Technical

Technical Support
Staff member
A simpler solution for downloads is just to add

#com /dev/tty.usbserial

as a line at the top of your programs.
 

kengabrielrov

New Member
Thanks for the hint Hippy,
I have looked at the config details but it appears the settings path stops at the user (me) and there are no entries for /library/preferences/....... They appear to be hidden files / directories and I'm obviously Mac illiterate as I can't find the way to "un-hide" them.

Here are the lines in the file:

Application Path : Macintosh HD:Users:kengabriel:Downloads:MacAXEpad.app:Contents:MacOS:
Compiler Path : Macintosh HD:Users:kengabriel:Downloads:MacAXEpad.app:Contents:MacOS:compiler_mac:
Documents Path : Macintosh HD:Users:kengabriel:Documents:
Temporary Path : Macintosh HD:private:var:folders:dh:0zjcl9wx17gdbcmymsrgsps80000gn:T:TemporaryItems:
Settings Path : Macintosh HD:Users:kengabriel:Library:preferences:


Its funny how people say "Mac - it just works"; I find windoze easier to work with, at least the file structures & attributes are obvious:-(
Hopefully the AXE027 will play the game without me pulling out what little hair I have left.
rgds
Ken
 

kengabrielrov

New Member
Hi,
Finally I have found the .ini file & edited it to suit my serial adapter. As before it is visible in 32 bit mode (now with the correct port settings according to the options window) but not in the default 64 bit mode. I have set myself as root, changed the wheel, rebooted (in 32 bit mode still) but the port is not being accessed by Macaxepad. I know this because the tx led on the adapter does not blink at all when I ask a known working PICAXE for its firmware version. It used to do that when it worked on OSX Leopard. Any other ideas please?
rgds
Ken
 

hippy

Technical Support
Staff member
the port is not being accessed by Macaxepad. I know this because the tx led on the adapter does not blink at all when I ask a known working PICAXE for its firmware version. It used to do that when it worked on OSX Leopard. Any other ideas please?
I presume by the LED on the adapter you are referring to the ATEN adapter. If so it's probably best to ask ATEN if they have a solution for 64-bit OSX Lion. It sounds to me like their driver does not support 64-bit mode but I am not familiar with that cable.

It may also be worth trawling Google for other Mac users' experiences. There seem to be a number of complaints that ATEN stopped working with OSX Lion and some suggested fixes.
 

kengabrielrov

New Member
Hi Hippy,
Yes the LED is the one on the ATEN adapter.
Prolific (who make the USB devices in the ATEN adapter) are probably onto it by now as there are many unhappy mac users around who were using some form of the prolific usb serial devices & drivers that stopped with LION. The PL2303 drivers are iffy to be polite. I have, after many days of experimentation (including a complete Apple instigated reload of the operating system in my "Air" as there are some "issues" with enabling the root user in Lion) and loading a couple of different driver packages found one that appears to work for that adapter.
Try the following link if you are using a PL2303 type adapter : https://github.com/failberg/osx-pl2303
The other fiddles for root & wheel still apply as does modifying the ini file.
I am still waiting for the AXE027 cable to arrive so I can see if that will just work out of the box (after loading the FTDI driver of course).
Now I just have to get over the loss of the PICAXE 18X :-( , these 18M2 devices are painful to use, toooo many options now!
rgds
Ken
 

humphpicaxe

New Member
Re USB-Serial @ Hippy

Dear Hippy,

You've made a few assertions about hardware requirements for usb-serial, but I have to say I see a consistent issue with Macaxepad and non 027 connectors that I am sure are due to macaxepad, not the hardware or drivers. I currently have a prolific USP-Ser, drivers loaded, works fine programming the picaxe under windows therefore has no hardware deficiencies, and the axepad.ini file is appropriately adjusted to use the tty.usbserial name, and works fine when using terminal within the macaxepad application to send and receive communication from an appropriately programmed 08M2 (it debugs when it gets a serrxd "go"). So all that works....but it still does not work to interrogate the firmware, or program the chip, and simply says "Hardware not found on /dev/tty.usbserial".

By the way, the processor directive #com /dev/tty....etc does not override the system setup. It is ignored.

So I think there's more to it, and I'd be very grateful if someone took a look at the code.
 

hippy

Technical Support
Staff member
@ humphpicaxe : Which Mac OS version are you using ? As noted earlier there have been problems with Prolific drivers.

Being able to use Terminal but not download is usually an issue of break signalling ( and that is possibly a driver issue if the cable works under Windows ) so it may be worthwhile trying a serial port test on the Mac.

I've made a note of the #com issue.
 
Top